June 27 Balance Update Preview

[LadyKitty.6120]

Since we're going down the buff rabbithole as of late in PVE, guess Kitty better give her numerous numeric suggestions now that she's updated her spreadsheet so she had pretty good grasp of how much damage/cast times various skills have and these numbers are directly compared to their rivalling weapons while taking utilities into account. (Note: casting times on tooltips are far from precise and Kitty went through the trouble of recording the cast times of invidual skills with Arcdps's reported cast times in golem logs to get correct numbers on basically all skills.)
Some numbers might seem drastic but that's just due to how underpowered some skills are (which explains why people don't use them). Also, previously when Kitty wrote similar post and some of the changes she proposed happened, people were quite happy with the results so that'd likely be the case if these also happen. In patch note format to allow some copy-pastaing in case you decide to implement these changes.

Warrior
Reckless Impact: Increased power coefficient from 1.5 to 2.5. (Not as high as DD or Vindi for which it's a spec-defining feature but still to make Sigil of Energy+Signet of Stamina meme build into a somewhat valid option. Also works for making power warr more viable.)
Body Blow: Increased the amount of Bleeding from 1 stack for 12 seconds to 2 stacks for 12 seconds. (Needed buff to make the trait work with condi Mace Berserker which is the only build benefitting from that trait.)

Currently Heal Shout Warrior is a dream of many players and during a core class raid run, the squad noticed that half of the players there had it geared but hadn't got to play it due to its currently lacking heal output. Since it heals through Tactics, Kitty has following suggestions:
Soldier's Comfort: Increased healing coefficient from 0.8 to 1.5 in PVE. Now also grants Regeneration for 5 seconds. (To allow healing without banners.)
Empowered: Now also increases Outgoing Healing by 2% for every boon on you.
Vigorous Shouts: Increased the base healing from 1000 to 1600 and healing power coefficient from 1.2 to 1.6 in PVE.
 

Currently Sword's auto-attack chain overshadows some power weapons and same is the case with Final Thrust as well. Some boosting is needed to make those weapons do the damage they should. Mace and hammer are rather slow-hitters but don't hit that hard to compensate atm so that needs to change.
And these are minimum required changes to do same Power DPS as main-hand sword (a condi weapon), going slightly higher doesn't hurt. Also, the Bleeding Kitty mentioned earlier for mace autos should come on top of these to almost match sword's auto-chain (sword would still have it slightly stronger due to faster attack speed). Even some of greatsword's non-burst skills struggle and axe's auto-attack chain is doing actually way lower DPS than sword's on power build (unless doing stowing memes). And to be clear, current power Berserker benchmark doesn't include any of the following skills as they didn't let any auto-attacks to happen and didn't use Rush. Hammer Spellbreaker bench also only did 2 auto-attack chains per rotation and those caused DPS drops.

Mace Smash: Increased power coefficient from 0.8 to 1.2 in PVE. Also inflicts 1 stack of Bleeding for 6 seconds.
Mace Bash: Increased power coefficient from 0.8 to 1.3 in PVE. Also inflicts 1 stack of Bleeding for 6 seconds.
Pulverize: Increased power coefficient from 1.6 to 2.0 in PVE. Also inflicts 1 stack of Bleeding for 6 seconds.
Counterblow: Increased power coefficient from 2.0 to 3.0 in PVE.
Pommel Bash: Increased power coefficient from 0.4 to 1.0 in PVE.
Crushing Blow: Increased power coefficient from 1.5 to 2.4 in PVE.
Tremor: Increased power coefficient from 0.8 to 1.5 in PVE.
Hammer Swing: Increased power coefficient from 0.9 to 1.1 in PVE.
Hammer Bash: Increased power coefficient from 0.9 to 1.1 in PVE.
Hammer Smash: Increased power coefficient from 1.2 to 1.6 in PVE.
Greatsword Swing: Increased power coefficient from 0.8 to 1.1 in PVE.
Greatsword Slice: Increased power coefficient from 1.05 to 1.1 in PVE.
Brutal Strike: Increased power coefficient from 1.5 to 1.6 in PVE.
Rush: Increased power coefficient from 2.5 to 3.5 in PVE.
Chop: Increased power coefficient from 0.8 to 1.0 in PVE.
Double Chop: Increased power coefficient from 1.6 to 2.0 in PVE.
Kick: Increased power coefficient from 1 to 1.8 in PVE.
Bolas: Increased power coefficient from 0.25 to 0.9 in PVE.
Stomp: Increased power coefficient from 0.75 to 1.5 in PVE.

Rifle could also use some buffing though not to the same level as melee weapons due to range advantage.
Kill Shot: Increased power coefficient from 2.25/2.75/3.25 to 2.5/3.0/3.5 in PVE.
Fierce Shot: Increased power coefficient from 1.0 to 1.1 in PVE.
Volley: Increased power coefficient from 3.75 to 4.2 in PVE.
Explosive Shell: Increased power coefficient from 1.5 to 2.3 in PVE.
Brutal Shot: Increased power coefficient from 1 to 2.5 in PVE.

Flurry: Increased power coefficient per hit from 0.33 to 0.475 in PVE. (It's for condi core Warrior and Spellbreaker which see literally 0 use atm, for a reason but still.)
Dual Shot: Increased power coefficient from 1.05 to 1.25 in PVE. (Super-slow cast time. Doesn't buff condi Berserker much but helps core Condi Warrior).
Impale: No longer inflicts Torment and inflicts 6 stacks of Bleeding for 12 seconds instead. (Torment doesn't synergize with rest of Condi Warrior's kit.)

Berserker

Same idea as above.

Skull Grinder: Increased power coefficient from 1.5 to 1.85 in PVE.
Rupturing Smash: Increased power coefficient from 1.5 to 1.75 in PVE.

Spellbreaker

Precise cut: Increased power coefficient from 0.6 to 0.65 in PVE.
Focused cut: Increased power coefficient from 0.65 to 0.7 in PVE.
Bladestorm: Increased power coefficient from 3.5 to 5.0. (Required to make off-hand dagger worth using.)

Bladesworn

Gunsaber is still underpowered compared to normal weapons and needs some buffing to get to similar level.

Swift Cut: Increased power coefficient from 0.7 to 0.9 in PVE.
Steel Divide: Increased power coefficient from 0.95 to 1.0 in PVE.
Explosive Thrust: Increased power coefficient of initial strike from 1.1 to 1.2 in PVE.
Blooming Fire: Increased power coefficient of initial strike from 0.8 to 1.2 and of follow-up explosions from 0.4 per hit to 0.5 per hit.

Engineer

Kitty's been requesting buffs to some kits for a good while to make them valid options. So...

Tool Kit has a couple of utility skills but it's otherwise a power weapon with heinously low DPS at the moment.
Throw Wrench: Increased power coefficient from 1.0 to 1.5 in PVE. (for comparison Surprise Shot has 1.0 as insta-cast)
Box of Nails: Now also does strike damage at the power co-efficient of 0.4 per hit in PVE. (It has a long cast.)
Smack: Increased power coefficient from 0.8 to 1.3 in PVE.
Whack: Increased power coefficient from 0.8 to 1.3 in PVE.
Thwack: Increased power coefficient from 1.75 to 2.8 in PVE. Now also heals mech for 4% of its maximum HP when hitting an enemy in PVE if Mechanist. (the slowest auto-attack chain in the game at 4.25 seconds for full chain without quickness.)

Flamethrower has potential for hybrid power/condi DPS build but for whatever reason it only burns on last hit of auto-attack. It's a FLAMETHROWER and the skill's name is FLAME JET. (Sorry about caps.) It's meant to burn, not to be high-pressure oil gun, rite?
Flame Jet: Now also inflicts 1 stack of Burning for 1 second on each hit in PVE. Increased power coefficient from 2.75 to 3.0 in PVE.

Elixir Gun doesn't seem to know whether it's a power, condi or support weapon. Let's make it a condi/support hybrid weapon.
Tranquilizer Dart: Increased Bleeding duration from 4 seconds to 6 seconds in PVE.
Fumigate: Increased Poison duration from 2 seconds to 6 seconds in PVE.
Acid Bomb: Reduced the power coefficient from 5.1 to 1.0 in PVE. Now also inflicts 3 stacks of Torment for 8 seconds in PVE.

Mortar Kit otherwise hits nicely but...Orbital Strike-toolbelt is actually DPS loss to use. (Surprised Kitty when she put in the damage numbers and recorded cast time.)
Orbital Strike: Increased power coefficient from 1.33 to 1.8 in PVE.

Necromancer

Dagger and greatsword have seen lots of buffing lately but axe's been left slightly behind due to weak auto-attack. Or well, quite a bit. Staff's auto-attack also hits reaaaaally low.

Rending Claws: Increased power coefficient from 1.0 to 1.25 in PVE.
Necrotic Grasp: Increased power coefficient from 1.0 to 1.45 in PVE. (Fireball-treatment.)

Death Shroud has been left behind other shrouds horrendously. Gotta fix that to make core Necro viable again!
Life Blast: Increased power coefficient from 1.45 to 1.8 in PVE.
Life Transfer: Increased power coefficient from 3.825 to 7.0 in PVE. (It has one of the longest casts in the game.)
Tainted Shackles: Increased power coefficient from 1.25 to 1.7 in PVE.

Thief

Currently it's a DPS loss to use Stealth Attacks and Dual Wields on sword.
Tactical Strike: Increased power coefficient from 1.0 to 1.7 in PVE.
Malicious Tactical Strike: Increased power coefficient from 1.0 to 1.7 in PVE.
Stab: Increased power coefficient from 1.05 to 1.3 in PVE.
Pistol Whip: Increased power coefficient of initial strike from 0.37 to 1.0 and of follow-up strikes from 0.77 to 0.9 per hit in PVE.
Flanking Strike: Increased power coefficient from 0.8 to 1.0 in PVE.
Larcenous Strike: Increased power coefficient from 1.6 to 2.0 in PVE.

Pistol could also use some buffing.
Vital shot: Increased Bleeding duration from 4 seconds to 6 seconds in PVE.
Repeater: Increased Bleeding duration from 3 seconds to 5 seconds in PVE. (Still not as strong as scepter's Twilight combo after this but still a good buff.)
Unload: Increased power co-efficient of invidual hits from 0.4 to 0.55.

Dancing Dagger, a ranged skill, is vastly overshadowed by Death Blossom, an evade, to the point of practical non-existence.
Dancing Dagger: Increased the Torment stacks from 1 to 2 and Torment duration from 6 seconds to 8 seconds in PVE. (compared to 3 stacks of Bleeding for 15 seconds on Death Blossom)

Guardian

Sword, longbow and greatsword have been buffed multiple times recently but scepter needs some buffing and staff's DPS skills also wouldn't complain about such. But since staff and scepter are ranged weapons, the buffs still need to reflect that advantage in by not raising to same level as melee weapons. But to factor in staff's role as healing weapon, staff is missing one DPS skill in Empower's slot which pays for its heal ability.
Orb of Wrath: Increased power coefficient from 0.6 to 0.75 in PVE.
Chains of Light: Increased power coefficient from 0.25 to 1.0 in PVE. (Currently hammer's Zealot's Embrace does similar thing better while doing some actual damage though with this moderate a buff, scepter still maintains the ranged weapon debuff.)
Bolt of Wrath: Increased power coefficient from 0.65 to 0.8 in PVE.
Searing Light: Increased power coefficient from 0.75 to 0.8 in PVE.
Seeking Judgment: Increased power coefficient from 0.9 to 1.1 in PVE.
Symbol of Swiftness: Increased power coefficient per hit from 0.5 to 0.6 in PVE.
Puncture Shot: Increased power coefficient from 1.0 to 1.1 in PVE.

Mace could also use a tiny bit of damage buffing since it hasn't been touched in a while. It's auto-attack chain is also uber-slow so those hits need some compensation in hit strength.
True Strike: Increased power coefficient from 0.8 to 1.0 in PVE.
Faithful Strike: Increased power coefficient from 1.55 to 1.7 in PVE.
Symbol of Faith: Increased power coefficient per hit from 0.65 to 1.0 in PVE. (It has almost twice the cast time as any other symbol but similar power coefficients so it needs some heavy lifting.)

With SotO approaching, axe's auto-attack needs to be tuned down a tiny bit since it currently does both condi and almost as good strike damage as power weapons. Off-hand sword needs some buffing to become competitive with focus which is the current choice of off-hand for Power Willbender
Searing Slash: Decreased power coefficient from 2.4 to 2.0 in PVE.
Executioner's Calling: Increased power coefficient of initial strike from 0.75 to 1.0.
Advancing Strike: Increased power coefficient from 2.0 to 2.5 in PVE.

Mesmer
Greatsword's auto-attack and scepter in general need some upwards tuning to match their competitors (Due to long cast and low power coefficient, GS auto-attack has currently less than half the DPS of sword and less than axe, about same as scepter!)
Also, though mirage does have sort of identity as pure condi spec atm, since virtuoso is already power/condi and chrono is power with capability for condi if scepter gets buffed, versatility-wise it wouldn't hurt to add some power modifiers to allow for some power builds to appear for mirage even if it stays primarily a condi spec. And currently most of Mirage ambushes are somewhat underpowered and as such prevents builds like Power Mirage from actually becoming a semi-viable thing.

Spatial Surge: Increased minimum power coefficient from 0.8 to 1.2 and maximum power coefficient from 1.1 to 1.4 in PVE. (Maximum would do ~80% of sword's auto-attack DPS and minimum would do ~68%.)
Split Surge: Increased power coefficient from 1.35 to 2.5 in PVE. (Yush, Kitty took into account that clones also use it at about 23.9% of mesmer's damage output per clone, for a total of 71.9% in Kitty's testing but long cast)
Mirage Thrust: Increased power coefficient from 1.0 to 3.0 in PVE. (Only mesmer does actual damage and has a long cast.)
Nomad's Endurance: No longer gives +150 Condition Damage. Instead, now increases (both strike and condition) damage by +10%.

Elementalist
Conjures have been ignored for a good while and there's quite a huge gap between auto-attacks of certain weapons/attunements as well as certain skills. And though some weapons do heal in Water, others don't and if a skill doesn't do anything support-, movement- or CC-wise, it should be considered a DPS skill with damage to reflect that.
Dragon's Claw: Increased power coefficient from 0.375 to 0.5 per hit in PVE. (would still be weaker than sword's fire auto-chain which also burns.)
Drake's Breath: Increased power coefficient from 3.2 to 4.5 in PVE. (Not really worth using for power builds atm.)
Vapor Blade: Increased power coefficient from 0.33 to 0.36 in PVE.
Lightning Whip: Increased power coefficient from 1.26 to 1.45 in PVE.
Chain Lightning: Increased power coefficient from 0.8 to 1.0 in PVE.
Ice Shards: Increased power coefficient from 0.72 to 0.9 in PVE.
Arc Lightning: Increased power coefficients from 0.45/0.9/1.8 to 0.6/1.2/2.4 in PVE.
Freezing Gust: Increased power coefficient from 0.25 to 1.0 in PVE. (Focus is now clearly a DPS weapon in Water.)
Comet: Increased power coefficient from 0.75 to 2.0 in PVE.
Aqua Siphon: Increased power coefficient from 0.75 to 1.3 in PVE.
Lava Axe: Increased power coefficient from 0.8 to 1.0 in PVE.
Double Lava Axe: Increased power coefficient per hit from 0.8 to 1.0 in PVE.
Explosive Lava Axe: Increased power coefficient from 1.5 to 2.0 in PVE.
Flame Leap: Increased power coefficient from 1.5 to 1.75 in PVE.
Lightning Leap: Increased power coefficient from 1.0 to 2.5 in PVE. (It has a long'ish cast.)
Flame Wave: Increased power coefficient from 0.65 to 0.75 per hit in PVE. (Looong cast.)

Revenant
Power Revenant builds have some room for DPS increase and especially hammer is currently extremely weak so some buffing's needed to create a good baseline across the weapons.
Preparation Thrust: Increased power coefficient from 0.75 to 0.8 in PVE.
Rift Slash: Increased power coefficient of the secondary hit from 0.225 to 0.3 in PVE.
Death Strike: Increased power coefficient of initial strike from 0.45 to 807 in PVE.
Unrelenting Assault: Increased power coefficient from 0.7865 to 1.0per hit in PVE. (Should hit a bit harder than just auto-attacking and has long cast.)
Hammer Bolt: Increased power coefficient from 1.1 to 1.45 in PVE.
Coalescence of Ruin: Increased power coefficient from 1.75 to 2.0 in PVE.
Phase Smash: Increased power coefficient from 2.0 to 2.5 in PVE.
Drop the Hammer: Increased power coefficient from 2.3 to 3.0 in PVE.
Rapid Swipe: Increased power coefficient from 0.65 to 0.75 in PVE.
Forceful Bash: Increased power coefficient from 0.75 to 0.8 in PVE.
Mender's Rebuke: Increased power coefficient from 1.5 to 2.25 in PVE.
Shattershot: Increased power coefficient from 0.65 to 0.8 in PVE.
Bloodbane Path: Increased power coefficient from 1.2 to 1.8 in PVE.

To be continuad.

Edited June 28, 2023 by LadyKitty.6120
Adjusted some values in response to SotO announcement.

[Drag You Down.2615]

On 6/10/2023 at 9:50 AM, NeedForSleep.7390 said:

Don't kill the one skill that makes me feel like a warrior. Just tome my damage down, I'll be a good boi

Omg, I can feel your desperation. 

[Drag You Down.2615]

Tbh, I'm not surprised with those changes. That's the trend for MMORPG. To make each class similar with another, so they can pursue the absolute equality. Look at FFXIV, GW2's balance patch is so similar to it recently.

In fact, the uniqueness means that you can do sth the other's can't. That's the SIN. Remember what is this called? Balance patch! How can someone doing something you can never do be called balanced? In real life we love it, in game designers hate it. Because then some players will shout: why can some classes bully me but I can't do anything? I want my favorite class to do the same thing. 

Really, nothing to be surprised. Those designers are just not brave enough to make the game "unbalanced", so from our point of view, it seems like they ran out of creativity. 

While alacrity and quickness are spreading out, Scourge is changed, Mirage is changed. Firebrand changed last year. I wonder who is the next. 

[Ascency.3580]

On 6/17/2023 at 6:35 PM, Bookah pls.9352 said:

Have you considered that mechanist loses access to toolbelt skills, and that's why their signets are stronger? 

have u considered mechanists trades the toolbelt for a annoyiong summon that for whatever reason has a spammable autouse knockback which is stupid in itself that can litterally solo stuff for the mechanist while the player is afk? have u been to dragon bash arena lately? 5 mechs afk in the middle. supreme gameplay. and signets are part of the reason its immovabe. its like this was intentional for mech to be an afk class.

[Yogurt Goblin.5934]

6 hours ago, Batalix.2873 said:

Iunno, I'm torn. On one hand yes FB shouldn't be the only build with on demand stab and aegis. On the other hand, stab and aegis already threaten to break the game and obviate mechanics anyway, and I'm not even sure FB should have it, let alone every profession getting stab or aegis.

I will say that I didn't say it in my original post, my wording pushed my stance in a certain level, but I want FireBrand to have the same level of Stab and Aegis as other classes, whether that means increasing other classes or decreasing guardian access to it.

I appreciate niches when it comes to a single encounter, e.g. chrono tower, heal scourge on Boneskinner, where they make the encounters easier, but the encounter isn't impossible without the class.

I feel like there is too many instances in the game where we are kinda forced to have atleast a certain class in the group. Matthias requiring reflect projectile and only Mesmer and Guardian having access to a skill thats good enough for it seem weird, especially when the encounter literally depends on it.

[Drag You Down.2615]

3 hours ago, Drag You Down.2615 said:

Because then some players will shout: why can some classes bully me but I can't do anything? I want my favorite class to do the same thing. 

While alacrity and quickness are spreading out, Scourge is changed, Mirage is changed. Firebrand changed last year. I wonder who is the next. 

I'll continue with what I said, after reading more people's posts. Some people thought classes are more similar to another, like Scourge is being like another mechanist, probably even a lesser version, since mechanist can have higher damage even with full healer gears. Mirage can no longer dodge while immobilized, like all other classes. 

And at the mean time, someone was saying that guardian should have less aegis and stab, like other classes, or let other classes like guardian.

The argument is that should one class stand out for its uniqueness or not. Sometimes, I don't think having bad balance method is designer's fault, because no matter what they do, someone will hate it. People want both uniqueness and equality, but didn't realize that they conflict with another. I really hope the balance team can find a middle point between two.

[LadyKitty.6120]

11 minutes ago, Drag You Down.2615 said:

I'll continue with what I said, after reading more people's posts. Some people thought classes are more similar to another, like Scourge is being like another mechanist, probably even a lesser version, since mechanist can have higher damage even with full healer gears. Mirage can no longer dodge while immobilized, like all other classes. 

And at the mean time, someone was saying that guardian should have less aegis and stab, like other classes, or let other classes like guardian.

The argument is that should one class stand out for its uniqueness or not. Sometimes, I don't think having bad balance method is designer's fault, because no matter what they do, someone will hate it. People want both uniqueness and equality, but didn't realize that they conflict with another. I really hope the balance team can find a middle point between two.

Quickness and alacrity have literally been gamebreaking boons for any support that hasn't had access to them. In at least PVE, only scourge has been used as a healer without either of those 2 and some classes have simply been left out of squads if they weren't able to provide one of those 2 boons (in case pure DPS slots were full) while some other classes haven't had such issue. The incoming changes rectify that. It's equality.

Meanwhile, uniquity doesn't necessarily need to come from results (aside from skills with utility or range having less damage or healing than pure melee DPS skills). In FF14 it comes from different playstyles and same is the case here. Though GW2 has it more distinct. Do you claim that dagger, sword and staff elementalist builds feel the same to play? If not, you also probably see what the GW2 build uniquity is about: how to get the results?

[jeferson.5679]

On 6/8/2023 at 5:12 PM, Rubi Bayer.8493 said:

Malicious Intent: Increased malice gain from 1 to 2 in PvE only.

could this change come for pvp ? 

[Drag You Down.2615]

47 minutes ago, LadyKitty.6120 said:

Meanwhile, uniquity doesn't necessarily need to come from results (aside from skills with utility or range having less damage or healing than pure melee DPS skills). In FF14 it comes from different playstyles and same is the case here. Though GW2 has it more distinct. Do you claim that dagger, sword and staff elementalist builds feel the same to play? If not, you also probably see what the GW2 build uniquity is about: how to get the results?

In FF14, I don't know how much you played it. I think most FF14 players can agree, the essential skills for all the roles in FF14 are nearly identical, they just have different graphics, especially for healers and tanks. The unique features, such as astrologian's cards are being nerfed so hard that there effects are very insignificant. All the tanks have very similar invulnerability skills with some variations.

It is indubitable that GW2 is on the same road, probably not that terrible. If alacrity is too strong, why not give it more limitation, or even cancel it to find something that won't break the game? And some other boons, like might and fury, why not make it more valuable and precious so people value it as much as alac and quick. Then people can start to plan how to form their group so they can have all of them, instead of letting all the classes being able to fit all the roles.

In terms of playing style, there is also a tendency of recycling, such as shroud, kits. Firebrand is the best example, it becomes like engineer tool kit. Also, the playing style involves with difficulty. Making a thing more difficult to most people means making it bad, even that is not necessarily true. But then you can see why certain weapons or skills are taken by more people, even they may have similar effects. Most Tempest healers will choose staff rather than dagger/warhorn, because staff is easier, although warhorn can be more useful sometimes. They have similar results, but one is harder one is easier to master. I personally don't think that contribute uniqueness, but wasting design space.

[LadyKitty.6120]

35 minutes ago, Drag You Down.2615 said:

In FF14, I don't know how much you played it. I think most FF14 players can agree, the essential skills for all the roles in FF14 are nearly identical, they just have different graphics, especially for healers and tanks. The unique features, such as astrologian's cards are being nerfed so hard that there effects are very insignificant. All the tanks have very similar invulnerability skills with some variations.

It is indubitable that GW2 is on the same road, probably not that terrible. If alacrity is too strong, why not give it more limitation, or even cancel it to find something that won't break the game? And some other boons, like might and fury, why not make it more valuable and precious so people value it as much as alac and quick. Then people can start to plan how to form their group so they can have all of them, instead of letting all the classes being able to fit all the roles.

In terms of playing style, there is also a tendency of recycling, such as shroud, kits. Firebrand is the best example, it becomes like engineer tool kit. Also, the playing style involves with difficulty. Making a thing more difficult to most people means making it bad, even that is not necessarily true. But then you can see why certain weapons or skills are taken by more people, even they may have similar effects. Most Tempest healers will choose staff rather than dagger/warhorn, because staff is easier, although warhorn can be more useful sometimes. They have similar results, but one is harder one is easier to master. I personally don't think that contribute uniqueness, but wasting design space.

Kity actually played FF14 quite a bit earlier this year, all classses above 60 and some at 90. Healers have a clearly different playstyle (Kitty mains healers), DPSers have their mostly unique playstyle (DNC, RDM, SMN and BLM all play different despite same role). And while tanks have similar tanking skills ('cause role skills are role skills), their DPS skills (tank DPS matters!) and how they work are different, not to mention sustain sources.

Edited June 19, 2023 by LadyKitty.6120
fixed wording

[Will Luigi.6180]

Firstly, I want to speak praise to the Balance team: there's a lot of big changes to the game's professions every patch and I'm excited to see each one. I think most of the changes here are good decisions and I especially appreciate the move to remove CD traits for skills and weapons to make room for more design space and interesting decisions in buildcraft.

The main issue I want to tackle in this post is Alacrity on Scourge and the dreaded Feed From Corruption trait. I want to offer an alternative solution:
- Shade duration remains as 20s (I think reducing this so drastically is going to negatively impact dps scourge too much)
- Desert Empowerment remains unchanged.
- Sand Savant now grants Alacrity around the big shade when you enter shroud (or when you use F2, since it is generally spammed with all scourge builds).
- Feed From Corruption no longer grants boons when corrupting or removing them, instead it could do one or more of the following:
-- Grants the Scourge an outgoing strike damage buff. (I mainly see Scourge played as a power dps in WvW)
-- Lifesteal from the target an amount of damage/health based on the number of boons removed/stripped. (keeps on theme of literally Feeding from corrupting enemies; additionally, excess health gained could be turned into self barrier)

[VacationDonkey.1748]

On 6/9/2023 at 3:56 PM, Caitmonster.9036 said:

I admit I do not enjoy the apparent homogenizing of the classes if it removes what was unique about them in the first place. 😕

 

 

Spot on.

Edited June 19, 2023 by VacationDonkey.1748

[Custodio.6134]

Unless i´m misunderstanding something, there are definitely a few mistakes that sneaked in, at least for druid (because, i just  had a discussion so i pulled this preview back up, and i noticed something), unless there are some additional, undocumented changes:

The first one: 
 

On 6/8/2023 at 11:12 PM, Rubi Bayer.8493 said:

Natural Convergence: This trait now grants might to nearby allies every pulse.

This one is probably just a typo. Natural Convergence isn´t a trait, it´s the Celestial Avatar Skill 5. 

The second one: 
 

On 6/8/2023 at 11:12 PM, Rubi Bayer.8493 said:

Lingering Light: This trait no longer grants increased outgoing healing after exiting Celestial Avatar, and it instead reduces the recharge of Celestial Avatar every time another player is healed by a celestial avatar skill.

So, you are saying: i reduce the cooldown of Celestial Avatar by healing with a Celestial Avatar-skill. However: in the current form, the CD of Celestial Avatar doesn´t even start until you EXIT Celestial Avatar. Which, as it is now, would make this trait do absolutely nothing (as you can only trigger it while IN Celestial Avatar, where the Cooldown hasn´t even started yet). 

So either, this is just a typo and they meant to change something entirely different, OR: there is an undocumented Change, which will make the CD of Celestial Avatar start upon ENTERING CA (not exiting as currently)

[Drag You Down.2615]

7 hours ago, LadyKitty.6120 said:

Healers have a clearly different playstyle

I'm sorry. As a healer main in all MMORPG, I really can't agree with this statement. They are just the same skill or at least extremely similar skills with different graphic effects. Their mechanics are nerfed many times so they won't affect the balance that much. Either extremely long cooldown or very weak effects. The main reason is commercialization. Anyone who is in art, music, design profession, doing creative works, should be able to understand this situation.

We are actually very lucky, GW2 haven't been there yet. It's actually still pretty far from being like that. That's why I'm here playing GW2. 

[Batalix.2873]

@Cal Cohen.2358

Copypasting this from another thread because it is related to this post and my assessment of how the past few balance patches really reveal how incomplete and rushed the EoD specs were and remain (and yes I am linking again because I want to make absolutely certain the devs see this). My prior posts in this thread:

https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/topic/131631-june-27-balance-update-preview/?do=findComment&comment=1910316

https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/topic/131631-june-27-balance-update-preview/?do=findComment&comment=1912966

https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/topic/131631-june-27-balance-update-preview/?do=findComment&comment=1910257

 

Weapons as Red Flags:

Prior especs didn't just slap a weapon on a class. They asked and answered the question "how would this profession use this weapon?" (in addition to really delving into evoking classic fantasy archetypes in a way I don't think EoD specs really do). With this principle we got, using HoT as an example:

* Dragonhunter - bow - light arrows

* Berserker - torch - smashing stick

* Herald - shield - crystal cocoon

* Druid - staff - cosmic laser healing rod

* Scrapper - hammer - conducting rod

* Daredevil - staff - acrobatic polearm

* Mesmer - shield - temporal wave gong-sundial thingy

* Tempest - warhorn - storm bard projectile instrument

And you can see this with a lot of PoF especs too between Firebrand using axe like a rune carver/crook, Scourge using torch like a kind of cursing incense burner, Deadeye using rifle like a sniper, and Holosmith launching light-projectiles with a sword. I could also stretch a bit and say that Soulbeast uses daggers like claws and Spellbreaker uses them like tonfas/swordbreakers, and Renegade uses a bow like an Amazonian warband or turrets. And however Mirage is using throwing axes, it is definitely distinct.

The EoD specs practically do nothing of the sort, except maybe Untamed (fancy that, the disjointed bunny thumper throwback being the most distinct) and maybe Virt (which isn't saying much since the weapon does almost the same one-note bladey-blade thing as the espec mechanic and traits). They all use their weapons in a dullardly straightforward manner, and it just weakens their job identity. What we *should* have gotten:

* Willbender - uses an OH sword ability to create a warding shield or summon a spirit.

* Bladesworn - uses pistol like a melee saber.

* Vindicator - has a move that throws the greatsword like a spear and jumps to it.

* Specter - conjures a whip with the scepter and uses it to pull allies (i.e. dodge assists, something a thief would actually use to protect allies instead of poaching shadow magic from Deadeye).

* Mechanist - controls the mech with the mace.

* Catalyst - lobs elemental orbs like a croquet mallet (with some actual modularity/choice and not railroading the player into the same tired four-elements loop).

* Harbinger - better choice for a ST healer since it's kind of a doctor/apothecary spec with an injection gun.

* Virtuoso - should have gotten shortbow and leaned more into mind control/psychic stuff just to break up the monotony of blades.

And while all of these are just casual proposals/suggestions, they highlight very obvious, resonant design space that was totally skipped over in favor of consistently bland weaponskills you would see on any core profession. And this obviously shallow, rushed design attitude is reflected in nearly every other aspect of the EoD specs.

The EoD specs are comparatively awful design. Half of them feel like a blatant rehash of prior especs (Specter, Catalyst, Willbender, and Mechanist), others have no real traitline identities or core conceit (Virtuoso, Untamed, Vindicator), and all of them feel like they just slapped a weapon on a profession without any more thought to it. The two worst examples from a weapon/concept perspective are pretty clearly Willbender and Specter, which don't feel at all like natural extensions of their core profession but just Daredevil and Scourge slapped on generic sword/scepter skills. Willbender could be leaving behind light walls on its virtue dashes; Specter could be slinging itself and allies around with a shadow whip--but instead their weapons/mechs work like any other profession AND aren't even on-brand for Guardian/Thief.

This juxtaposition makes extremely clear that these especs were rushed and merely reused prior weapon animations rather than implementing their own concepts like prior especs. And add to this that most of their traitlines lack a clear conceit/identity or are fairly single-minded, and the fact that all of them are just overtuned....

The devs need to stop trying to bring the game "up" to the EoD specs because there is no "up" in that direction. There is only "shallower". Make the EoD specs deeper and actually distinct specialties and most of your imagined "balancing" issues would have solved themselves. But stop tearing down years of very good, flavorful, mechanically diverse and frankly brilliant design from HoT/PoF that comprise much of the game's staying power just to camouflage your rush-job of an expansion and maintain your little bubble of denial that "you did a good job" with EoD. You didn't. Untamed still has no core conceit. Mechanist keeps bouncing radically between equally superficial band-aids and still fundamentally breaks the game. Specter just lost its bizarro ST gimmick that never made sense, and is now just even more Scourge 2.0.  Catalyst is still janky, inefficient Scrapper+Tempest+Weaver. Virtuoso is still a broken, unidimensional DPS spec that is as interesting as a thousand papercuts. Vindicator and Willbender remain generic despite having loads of obvious potential for distinct niches.

A year and a half later, these specs are still BADLY DESIGNED because they were paper thin then, and you have not taken the time to properly develop and re-release them. This is beyond apologism, and I refuse to allow these especs to be normalized. They are not up to par, they never have been, and you are hurting an amazing game with these patches that pretend they are.

TO ANYONE SAYING THIS IS IRRELEVANT: This is extremely relevant. The EoD specs were very clearly rushed design that the devs have been doubling down on. Across the board you see signs of thin development, reused concepts/animations, unexplored design space and an overall homogeneity that did not exist in PoF/HoT. And the general tendency since EoD launch has been to cover up these issues with overtuning the specs and making them far too easy to play. And it is the utter unwillingness to address the elephant in the room that explains why Necro, Mesmer, and Thief identities are being eroded this patch. This "standard" set by the EoD specs is why the HoT and PoF especs are getting gutted: to try to make the EoD specs look good. Because, after all, people can't complain about tall poppies in a field of poppies if you mow them all down and pretend it was always a dandelion field. You cannot complain about losing class identity and homogenization and ignore the EoD specs have always been precisely that; the parts are all interconnected.

Over the past year I made peace with the reality that this game I love mostly ended halfway through IBS. That EoD and beyond is largely a victory lap run on fewer resources and drained brains, but that's okay because I still had plenty to enjoy exploring in pre-EoD content on older especs. These patches have been systematically breaking down even the modest comfort I had knowing HoT/PoF could be largely preserved and enjoyed. You couldn't just let your "we gotta release something" EoD specs be bad "over there" in PvP Land. No, you had to let their rushed design philosophy infect all the other especs, the actual crown jewels of your game. And I take major umbrage at this. I will likely stop playing if things keep going this direction.

Edited June 23, 2023 by Batalix.2873

[Drag You Down.2615]

39 minutes ago, Batalix.2873 said:

And it is the utter unwillingness to address the elephant in the room that explains why Necro, Mesmer, and Thief identities are being eroded this patch. 

Can't agree more. They don't care if their design is creative or not, fun or not. They are just trying to find a way that can achieve balance in all specs. This makes their life easier, and probably reduce the chance to work overtime and be criticized by their boss. 

But as a gamer, a customer, the consumer of your product, I feel BAD!

[Batalix.2873]

23 minutes ago, Drag You Down.2615 said:

Can't agree more. They don't care if their design is creative or not, fun or not. They are just trying to find a way that can achieve balance in all specs. This makes their life easier, and probably reduce the chance to work overtime and be criticized by their boss. 

But as a gamer, a customer, the consumer of your product, I feel BAD!

These "balance patches" are revealing themselves to be less about "balance" and more about making the EoD specs look good in retrospect. But ugly is ugly and dumb is dumb, and all this has done is made for very volatile patch periods that go especially hard on HoT/PoF especs while hardly touching EoD especs. It's inefficient, it's destructive, it's delusional, it is so many bad things.

They should have just fixed the kitten EoD specs. Like 80 percent of all of this would likely have been unnecessary.

Edited June 19, 2023 by Batalix.2873

[BenaSPACE.6028]

This idea just hit me, and I think it would be a good change to make scrapper quickness pretty good!

Kinetic Accelerators: Grants 4s quickness and 8s fury when completing a blast, jump or whirl finishers (4 second cooldown on this effect). When you grant superspeed to an ally, extend the duration of boons by 2 seconds.

Also, because I think it needs it, 

Bulwark Gyro grants aegis when initially cast.

Edited June 19, 2023 by BenaSPACE.6028

[Drag You Down.2615]

1 minute ago, Batalix.2873 said:

These "balance patches" are being revealed more and more to be less about "balance" and more about making the EoD specs look good in retrospect. But ugly is ugly and dumb is dumb, and all this has done is made for very volatile patch periods that go especially hard on HoT/PoF especs while hardly touching EoD especs. It's inefficient, it's destructive, it's delusional, it is so many bad things. They should have just fixed the kitten EoD specs.

I did notice that. From the Firebrand change last year, to Mirage and Scourge this year, all PoF specs. And the reason why they are changed is because their design is too unique, too brilliant, too fun to play. XD 

[Batalix.2873]

2 minutes ago, Drag You Down.2615 said:

I did notice that. From the Firebrand change last year, to Mirage and Scourge this year, all PoF specs. And the reason why they are changed is because their design is too unique, too brilliant, too fun to play. XD 

In fairness, Firebrand and to some extent Scourge and Renegade are partly to blame for the EoD specs. Those classes always just did too many things well at once instead of having clearer specialty niches like Druid/Tempest/Herald/Chrono. And then given how overused they were the devs seemed to try to make every EoD spec another Firebrand.

[Drag You Down.2615]

31 minutes ago, Batalix.2873 said:

In fairness, Firebrand and to some extent Scourge and Renegade are partly to blame for the EoD specs. Those classes always just did too many things well at once instead of having clearer specialty niches like Druid/Tempest/Herald/Chrono. And then given how overused they were the devs seemed to try to make every EoD spec another Firebrand.

Copying their past success. Understandable but hateful. 

[Tekk.6789]

I like the changes to Herald. Currently it is spammy and not enjoyable or engaging to play. Having to do two key presses per facet was not good design and I'm glad it is being changed. Hopefully it doesn't impact our ability to provide high might due to burst of strength being one of our dps cooldowns.

I don't play much WvW so I can't say much about the heal Vindi changes, but the urn heal nerf seems like a lot considering we can't even heal ourselves while we have it active. 

As usual nothing for condi Renegade regarding trait lines so we aren't forced into charged mists. It's not a fun playstyle and only good on bosses like MO with no movement and immunity phases so you aren't just sitting there on energy and having to reset it quickly by spamming a bunch of skills to get below the required energy threshold. Also the build itself is not new player friendly and requires high APM to be able to play it effectively since you have little room for error or you won't be below ten energy for the swap. Please take a look at the traits and give us more options for condi Renegade.

[nucklepuckk.1805]

On 6/18/2023 at 8:09 AM, DirtyDan.4759 said:

If your playstyle is affected by this it means you never gave might on druid. Time to wake up.

Warhorn 5 and Might Spirit. Wake up.

[Zionite.5924]

Will y'all be fixing the event needed to allow the NPC to sell the Bird Whistle for the Skyscale toy collection achievement? It's currently bugged and won't start and is blocking progress for a number of player.

[Fang.1407]

On 6/16/2023 at 2:24 PM, Lucinellia.9247 said:

Eh. I mean, I have an entire post about the issues with single target healing in Guild Wars 2. You are welcome to read it, since it is a good comparison with what happens in other MMOs to enable single target healing. I have some other posts and comments, which you are welcome to read up on.

In short, the game design doesn't support single target healing (we have no fights where it is needed). The game also doesn't support ally targeting - we have no mouseover macros, we have no quick targeting for different people, our hotkeys for cycling allied targets include downed people(!) and also mini pets(!!). We also can't move the raid frames, meaning if we did want to do single target ally healing, our mouse needs to travel a lot! The experience is entirely miserable, since Guild Wars 2 isn't designed for it, and picking through targets to heal is in direct contradiction to how the rest of the game plays. It is a slow and deliberate action in a game that doesn't have slow, single target damage patterns or limitations such as mana to encourage conservative healing.

Siphon works for a bit of Shadow Force in theory, but then we need to ensure that small amount of SF is enough to get through sufficient skills for putting out enough alacrity so that it stays up until we can enter shroud and cast spells again. This doesn't apply to Strikes or Raids, where we are given SF on entry, but it is an issue for Fractals. 

Just because it "isn't needed" doesn't mean they should take it out of the game and destroy the theme and playstyle of an elite spec. It also doesn't mean it's not a very powerful tool in many situations. As they said when they introduced it, Specter's single target skills have really high healing since they are single target. This makes it very useful when one target is what really matters. For example, keeping a tank alive during Soulless Horror when the other tank dies and saving a run, or barriering up Glenna when you have to defend her during raids. You can even target a stand-in handkite and make them immortal. In QTP Specter is also really good at healing the pylon kiters if something goes wrong (the healing on the single target abilities is very high compared to other healers' skills and Specter has high movement on top of that. Shadow shroud also has a very good range for this.) I've also made a play a few times where I would make a ranger nigh-immortal on a wall in WvW, give them quickness and stab, and let them wreak constant havoc on the enemy team with their longbow with basically no consequences.

Specter having single target healing also allows them, as I said before, to heal both subgroups on their own. There are several ways to heal/barrier your own subgroup a ton, one of those being over time. Then you can use 3 on sc/p (and the scepter stealth attack) to heal the other subgroup, which also splashes healing from the shadowstep traits onto your own group if they still need more healing. This comes in especially handy if your group is taking constant low ticks of damage since with AoE healing you would only target your own group most of the time with how the subgroup system works. Since Specter can heal both groups effectively this lets you take out the other healer for many fights if needed (which I have had done when we needed more damage for some raid fights) and lets you give a bit of help for less experienced healers if needed.

Now about the targeting issues, I do agree that they could do better about making it more accessible, as the only good way currently to target someone is through the party/squad menu. I said in the previous update preview that they need to introduce a better allied targeting keybind that doesn't target clones and NPCs to make it easier for many people to play it. However, these things not being in the game doesn't warrant them taking out single target healing, but rather it warrants them adding in the quality of life things it needs to make it easier for many people to play. Also, just want to bring this to attention, I've never heard anyone else say "I have to move my mouse too much" about literally anything in this game...

I know I'm kind of repeating myself here, but just because it's "not needed" doesn't mean it's not very useful. Or fun for that matter. Maybe not fun for you, but if you don't think it's fun, then just don't play it. Anywho, I hope this doesn't come off as me being frustrated with you in particular. Just kind of tired of seeing people say "remove single target healing" just because they personally don't like how it plays at the moment. It would be better to add more support, rather than gutting it and making Specter another "press a button to heal in a circle" thing.